The music industry heavyweight claims YouTube hasn't made all necessary deals for its new subscription service.
- Nov 13, 2014
AceShowbiz - Irving Azoff is planning to remove the music by artists he represents from YouTube. Following announcement that Google would launch YouTube Music Key, he told The Hollywood Reporter that he's prepared to take around 20,000 copyrighted works away from the video-sharing site and its new subscription service.
Those 20,000 songs include the works by popular musicians like Pharrell Williams, The Eagles, Boston, Foreigner, John Lennon, Smokey Robinson, Chris Cornell as well as George Gershwin and Ira Gershwin.
Azoff is a former chairman of Live Nation who founded Global Music Rights (GMR), a new venture seeking higher royalties for songwriters. The 66-year-old music manager says streaming services are growing bigger and bigger by days. Thus, people who compose the music deserve more compensation.
"The way fans listen to music is evolving daily," Azoff told THR. "GMR is going to give songwriters and publishers an opportunity to engage in meaningful licensing for their intellectual property. The trampling of writers' rights in the digital marketplace without any regard to their contribution to the creative process will no longer be tolerated."
Azzoff also claimed that YouTube hadn't made all necessary deals for its new subscription service. According to the music mogul, the company and record labels have only made deals that cover sound recording rights. There are still no deals that support publishing rights.
Google, who owns YouTube, announced YouTube Music Key on Wednesday, November 12. The much-anticipated subscription service is set to compete against Spotify and Pandora. It will be launched next week in a beta mode and is expected to officially go public next year.
The ad-free subscription service will enable various mobile features including the ability to play YouTube music while sending texts or doing other activities on a phone. Users will also be able to listen to music offline.
